


Breaking Communications

by Spaceman130



Series: Falling Rain, Spilling Blood [2]
Category: Futurama
Genre: Gen, Night, Rain, alley, nightwalkers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-10
Updated: 2014-10-23
Packaged: 2018-02-19 22:34:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2405351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spaceman130/pseuds/Spaceman130
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fry and his team are tasked with destroying an antenna to cut off communications between their enemies.  Unfortunately, Fry runs into some unexpected problems on the way there...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Breaking Communications, Part 1

**Friday, September 2, 3008**

**9:15 PM**

 

Being careful to keep his grip at the top of the tall sewer ladder, Hermes grunted as he lifted an arm up and pushed the heavy iron manhole cover up from its place and slid it aside. He was greeted by a loud, booming clap of thunder. He sighed glumly as he felt the continuous, cool stream of raindrops beat against his head for the second time that night.

Having grown up in Kingston and being accustomed to mostly hot, sunny days, Hermes hated rain. But he knew that had he and his team been fighting the nightwalkers on a clear night, they wouldn't have a chance of surviving.

Hermes climbed out of the sewer and stood next to the cover he had moved. Looking down, he spotted Fry moving his hands and feet over the ladder's rungs, ascending up to the city's surface.

A few seconds later, Fry pulled himself up out of the stench-riddled hole and climbed to his feet next to his leader, grateful to be away from the unpleasant smells and the gruesome death he was unfortunate enough to have witnessed. Hermes bent down to move the manhole cover back to its place, then he stood up once more.

"Come on, Fry. This way," he urged his ginger-haired teammate, motioning toward a dimly lit alley not far from where they stood.

The two soldiers took off toward a tall building shaped like a rectangular prism. The building had an iron ladder on one side.

Fry gaped in disbelief at the incredibly long height of the ladder. _I have to climb_ that _?_ he thought. The ladder was numerous stories high, stretching all the way up to the building's roof.

"Let's climb," Hermes instructed. He gripped the ladder and began to pull himself up its rungs.

Fry waited for Hermes to climb twice his height before continuing after him, staring in awe at the height of the building he would have to scale. He estimated it was at least fifty floors high.

After several minutes of climbing, Hermes made it to the top, with Fry trailing a few feet below him. When he saw what was on the roof, Hermes let out a startled cry. "What the — ?" he uttered aloud.

Startled by his leader's sudden outburst, Fry nearly lost his grip on the rung he was holding onto. He managed to keep it, though, and continued to climb. His heart started to pound as he wondered what had just caused Hermes to cry out in shock.

_What's up there?_ Fry thought fearfully. _Torn up bodies? Nightwalkers? Something worse?_

When he had almost made it to the top, Fry peered over the roof, his eyes level with the flat surface. Aside from Hermes and the small shed-sized structure which led inside the building, there was nothing and no one else to see on it.

Fry climbed to his feet on the roof and made his way over to Hermes. "There's no one here," he noted, oblivious to the problem. "What's the matter, Captain?"

" _That's_ the matter. There's no one here," Hermes replied sharply, motioning a hand toward the empty roof. "This is the rendezvous point where the advance team was supposed to meet us. Where in blazes are they?"

Fry shrugged his shoulders. "Beats me."

This was bad news. The advance team was supposed to meet Hermes and his team on this rooftop so they could supply them with more powerful weapons. Without them, completing their extermination job was going to be that much more difficult.

Fry watched as jagged white bolts of lightning lit up the jet black sky, momentarily turning it a dark shade of purple. Another roar of thunder followed a few seconds later. He shivered as cold drops ran down his face and pattered against his shoulders.

Like Hermes, Fry hated rain, too. He loathed the coldness, the dreariness, and the colorlessness it brought to the world every time the clouds unleashed their misery.

Fry heard light metallic clanging sounds rising up from behind him. He turned around to see Leela climb up on top of the roof.

She jogged over to the two men and scanned the otherwise vacant rooftop. "Where's the advance team?" she asked with a hint of confusion in her voice.

"I was wondering the same thing," Hermes replied, sounding equally as addled.

"What's going on?" Leela asked aloud, though she meant the question to be rhetorical.

_I wish I knew,_ Fry thought.

Hermes opened his mouth to speak. But before he could get a word out, the communicators on his and his teammates' headsets rang, and a familiar, cringe-inducingly conceited voice spoke up.

"This is Brannigan calling extermination team leader."

_"Zapp?"_ Leela cried in disgust. "What are _you_ doing calling us?"

"That's _Colonel_ Zapp Brannigan to you, Turanga," Brannigan replied curtly. "I'm here to tell you men — and women — that there's a couple of small problems with the ongoing operation."

"Wait — you're the colonel of the EIB now?" Hermes demanded. "What happened to Colonel Fitzpatrick?"

"Ah, yes. That's problem number one," Brannigan answered indifferently. "I'm afraid he's suffered a . . . um . . . what was it again, Kroker?"

A deep sigh rang through all of the team members' earpieces. "A coronary attack."

"Yes, that's it. A coronary attack," Brannigan said as if he couldn't care less about the deceased former colonel. "And quit sighing, for God's sakes."

Fry, Leela and Hermes each exchanged suspicious glances. They each knew that Colonel Fitzpatrick was in his early fifties and in good health, so it seemed very odd that he would die from a heart attack at such a relatively young age.

"I'm sorry to hear that, sir," Hermes said concernedly.

"I volunteered for the position of EIB colonel to protect Earth from the nightwalker threat after Fitzpatrick's passing," Brannigan explained. "Once the general saw my impressive track record as a twenty-five-star army general and commander of D.O.O.P., he didn't have to think twice about handing me the rank. So, from here on in, _I'm_ in command."

_The general must not have thought_ once _if he named you colonel,_ Leela thought bitterly. She let out a loud, exasperated groan and covered her eye with the palm of one hand.

Brannigan ignored Leela's reaction. "Your first objective, soldiers, is to destroy every single communications facility in New New York. Cutting off those bloodsuckers' ability to communicate by phone should make your mission easier."

"I beg your pardon, sir, but didn't the advance team already take care of that?" Hermes demanded.

"There's still an active comm antenna they haven't taken out yet," Brannigan replied. "I'm having its location coordinates uploaded to your command vehicle."

"Have you been able to contact the advance recon team yet?" Hermes asked.

"That's problem number two. We haven't been able to get a word from them or even figure out where they are. We've put a probe up to see if we can locate them, but until we do, you'll have to make do without them. You four are on your own. Brannigan out."

All of the team's communicators made a distinctive beep, indicating that Brannigan had ended the call.

"Rodríguez. Did you hear all that?" Hermes asked his robotic teammate.

"Yeah, not that I wanted to," Bender replied dryly.

"Look around the command vehicle for a small black device with two metal prongs on its end," Hermes commanded. "We'll need it for this mission."

"Aye aye, Captain Meatbag," Bender grumbled.

The rest of the team heard a series of clunking sounds as the obnoxious robot shuffled around the interior of the command vehicle, searching for the item. Finally, the clunking stopped.

"Found it. What the hell is it?" Bender demanded.

"It's an electromagnetic pulse generator," Hermes explained. "It triggers a high-voltage electric pulse strong enough to short out electronic circuitry. So don't even _think_ about using it on yourself, Rodríguez!"

"Aw, crap!" Bender cried.

"For this phase of the mission, we've got a new rendezvous point — Malfunctioning Eddie's Rocket Car Emporium," Hermes continued. "It's only a block or so from our current position. Rodríguez, I'll need you to meet us there with the EMP generator and some of the extra weapons and ammo we've been saving."

"Roger that, I'll see your asses there. Rodríguez out." There was a beep as Bender terminated the call.

Hermes shut off his own communicator and faced Fry and Leela. "You two know what to do. We'll go to the comm facility after we meet up with Rodríguez."

"Wait a minute. Where _is_ the comm facility?" Fry asked.

"Over there," Hermes replied, pointing a finger toward a large satellite dish on top of a building a few blocks away. "Look at it through your scopes."

Fry and Leela both lowered their displays over their eyes and pressed in a small knob on the right side of their headsets. They both now had telescopic views at double magnification. Fry found that if he turned the knob, he could magnify his view by up to eight times. Both soldiers took a good, long look at the antenna, then shut their scopes off with a second press of the knob.

"That's the antenna we're going to take out," Hermes explained. "But in order to destroy it, we'll need to get the EMP generator from Rodríguez. We'll meet up with him at Malfunctioning Eddie's."

"Can we all go together?" Fry asked eagerly.

Hermes shook his head. "No. We'd stick out too much and probably get caught. It'd be better if we split up."

Fry hung his head in disappointment.

Hermes walked over to the shed-sized structure. It had a pair of automatic doors that slid open when he neared them.

"I'll go first," Hermes said. "The two of you stay put until I give you the go-ahead. Understood?"

"Yes, sir," Fry and Leela replied together.

"Okay. I'll see you two at Malfunctioning Eddie's." Hermes turned away from his teammates and hurried through the automatic doors. A few seconds later, the doors slid shut behind him.

Leela walked over to the wall on the side of the door and leaned her back against it. "Looks like we're going to be here a while," she muttered, wiping away the long, thick purple bang of hair that the rain had caused to mat against her face.

Fry looked over at Leela. She wore her hair the way she usually did, except her ponytail was cut off to allow her headset to fit around her head. Fry was disappointed by this; he liked the way she looked with her ponytail better.

While he waited for Hermes's command, Fry played around with the features of his display. He read signs on buildings a block over, checked out the radar map of the city, and viewed the area in the bright green glow of night vision. Out of curiosity, he viewed Leela using necrovision to see what color she would appear. Being that she was a mutant, she showed up as a glowing hot pink figure in the view.

As he admired Leela's pink aura, Fry thought about whether or not he should tell her about her mother's demise. It was something that had been troubling him since he saw poor Munda kicking and screaming while being pulled up into the pipe by God-knows-what sort of sadistic creature.

_She deserves to know what's going on in her family, including her mother being killed. But will she understand that there was nothing I could do to save her? Or will she blame me and get angry at me for not protecting her? What if she's so upset she refuses to forgive me?_

The charge on Fry's necrovision ran out, and the pink glow disappeared from Leela's figure. He sighed and lifted the display from his eyes, waiting for the necrovision to charge back up again.

It had been several minutes since Hermes had left them up on the rooftop, and Fry hadn't spoken a word to Leela. He spent that time wondering what he should say to her, if anything at all.

Finally, he decided he should just tell her and get it over with. He turned and looked over at Leela, his face full of concern.

"Leela, there's something you should know about," Fry said, his voice coming out soft and unsettled.

Leela looked him in his upset eyes and began to walk toward him. She opened her mouth to reply — but stopped when both of their communicators rang.

"This is Conrad. I've made it to Malfunctioning Eddie's," Hermes announced. "Fry, Turanga, you can head over now. Be very careful." The call ended with a beep.

"We'd better get going," Leela said, starting to walk over to the automatic doors. She stopped and looked back at Fry. "Sorry, Fry. What is it you wanted to say?"

Fry lost his nerves. He paused for a few seconds before speaking. "Forget it," he said, shaking his head. "Let's go."

Without saying another word, Leela turned around and started toward the doors. Fry followed after her, kicking himself mentally over not having the courage to break the bad news to her.

_If I'm not brave enough to tell Leela her mother died, how am I going to handle a city crawling with bloodthirsty monsters?_ Fry thought dejectedly.

The doors slid open when Leela was a foot away from them. She slipped inside the building, with Fry making sure to stay close behind her.

The doors led to the building's countless flights of stairs which ended in the building's basement. Fry and Leela both began to make their way down the seemingly endless series of stairs. Fry struggled to keep up with Leela as she darted agilely down the stairs, taking them two at a time. Leela had run down less than half of the building's stories when she heard Fry gasping for breath.

"Can't we . . . just take . . . the elevator?" he asked, panting between words. Stopping and looking back, Leela saw that Fry looked exhausted, his face glistening with sweat.

"There could be nightwalkers in the building," Leela replied. "It's safer to take the stairs because hardly anyone uses them."

"Great," Fry muttered tiredly. _Why do buildings in the future have to have so many floors?_ he thought bitterly. It was half an hour into the mission and he already felt wiped out. At least by taking the stairs inside the building he could escape the pouring rain for a while.

"Rest if you have to," Leela said. "I'll wait for you at the ground floor."

Leela turned away from Fry and continued to jog down the stairs. Fry leaned against a wall and waited for a minute to catch his breath and let his aching feet rest.

Looking to his right, Fry saw a door with a sign next to it marked with a bold black 27.

_Twenty-seven floors to go,_ he thought tiredly.

With a sigh, he started to make his way down the remaining stairs. He began to pant and puff when he reached the sixteenth floor, but he forced himself to keep on going, despite his physical tiredness.

As Fry continued to make his way down, he pictured Leela standing at the ground floor with her arms crossed below her chest, leaning against the wall and tapping her foot impatiently against the floor. He couldn't keep track of the number of times in his life he had found himself feeling envious of Leela's athleticism.

Fry couldn't have been more relieved when he finally made it to the ground floor. Spotting Leela standing next to the door at the building's side entrance, he slowed his pace to a walk and stepped up next to her. He crouched down with his hands on his knees, gasping for breath once again. Beads of sweat dripped from his face onto the floor. His heart thumped against his chest. His feet ached.

Leela waited for Fry to recover before asking him if he was ready to head outside.

"Yeah," Fry gasped out, unable to hide his exhaustion. "Let's go."

There was a pair of automatic doors at the ground floor. Leela and Fry walked outside through them, and as the rain began to patter against their heads, they heard the doors slide shut behind them.

Fry looked around and realized that the two of them were in a dead-end alley. Turning around, he noticed that although he was near the automatic doors, they refused to open. There was a small panel with numbered buttons next to the doors. In order for the doors to open, one would have to enter a correct code.

The narrow alley led out to two separate paths, one leading left and the other right.

"Which way do we go?" Fry asked.

"Hermes said we should split up," Leela reminded him. "I'll take the path to left. You go right — it's the shortest route to Malfunctioning Eddie's, according to the radar."

"Thanks."

"See you later," Leela said, looking back at Fry for a moment before she broke into a jog. She ran up to the end of the alley and disappeared around the corner on the left.

Fry sighed. _Looks like it's just me now,_ he thought glumly. He started to walk toward the end of the alley, wiping moisture off his face and sleeves.

Fry kept his face tilted downward to prevent the rain from pouring directly onto it. He lowered his display over his eyes and examined his radar. He saw that Leela was right; Malfunctioning Eddie's was marked with a glowing orange dot not far from his current position. If he just went through the alley to the right and crossed the street, he'd be there in no time.

Fry started to turn right into the alley — but stopped when he heard a voice.

His heart starting to pound, he went back and crouched down behind one side of a pair of dumpsters next to him. He pulled his pistol out of its holster and listened hard.

The voice was coming from the direction Fry needed to go. It was a feminine voice humming a soft, innocent tune he had never heard before, most likely made up.

He swore he knew who the voice belonged to, even though he hadn't heard it in a long time.

Fry peered cautiously around the dumpster, careful not to stick his head out too much. The alley was barely lit by a dim light on Fry's side. The end of the alley where the voice was emanating from was close to being pitch-dark.

_Who is it? Where do I know that voice from?_ Fry wondered.

His question remained unanswered for only a few more moments. Fry held his breath and watched as a familiar figure emerged from the darkness.


	2. Breaking Communications, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fry gets caught in a dangerous situation while making his way to his teammates.

**Friday, September 2, 3008**

**9:41 PM**

 

Fry exhaled as he saw the comfortingly familiar sight of a certain petite, black-haired female wearing a pink hooded midriff sweater, equally pink sweatpants, and dark pink boots walking into the light.

 _It's only Amy,_ Fry thought with relief. _And she's okay._

He desperately wanted to talk to Amy and ask what had happened to her. She had been declared missing for the past four months, and every day since her disappearance, Fry had wondered where she was and if she was all right.

As he watched Amy walk leisurely into the dimly lit alley, Fry caught sight of her expression. She wore a nonchalant smile that was all too cheerful for someone wandering around a rain-soaked city at night, especially one becoming increasingly populated by fierce, bloodsucking creatures.

 _Where has she been all this time?_ Fry wondered. _Does she know about the nightwalkers? Should I warn her?_

He hesitated at that last thought, remembering the strict instructions he'd been given back at EIB headquarters. The EIB was a top secret organization, and in order to keep it that way, he'd been ordered not to expose his presence to any civilians. He figured he'd look a little silly popping out of the blue looking like a redheaded Solid Snake.

At the same time, though, Fry figured it would be right to warn Amy about the terror secretly going on in the city. After all, it was his sworn duty to protect the public from the nightwalker threat, and as long as he was doing just that, what did it matter if Amy saw that he was a soldier? She knew him; they were co-workers. She'd understand.

Fry started to get up and reveal himself to Amy.

A second figure appeared from around the same darkened corner that Amy had come from. Fry suddenly stopped and stayed crouched behind his cover.

The figure approached Amy at the same unhurried pace that she was walking at. As it was nearly shrouded by shadows, Fry could only make out its shape at first. It was that of a portly man that, strangely enough, also looked familiar to him.

As the rotund figure entered the light, Fry recognized the man by the blue jacket he wore over a white shirt tucked into blue pants, along with his thick gray mustache and brown cap.

The man was Scruffy, the janitor at Planet Express.

 _What is Scruffy doing following Amy into an alley at this time of night?_ Fry wondered. _And in the rain, too?_

Fry studied Scruffy a bit more. He thought he could make out what looked like an excited smile underneath his mustache, widening with every step he took toward the Chinese-Martian intern.

Fry figured that something was definitely wrong with the scene unfolding in front of his eyes. Amy and Scruffy looked much too happy given the darkness, the weather, and the city's horrific ongoings. Fry noticed that Scruffy was trailing a few yards behind Amy, who was smiling and humming innocently.

 _Is he . . ._ stalking _her?!_ Fry thought, unable to believe what he was seeing.

Fry dismissed that last query after Amy stopped in her tracks and turned around to face Scruffy, whom she allowed to walk right up to her without any hesitation. Amy stopped humming, but her cheery mien didn't fade. She raised her pretty almond-shaped eyes up to his and gave him a playful, teasing smile.

Fry heard a soft chuckle emerge from Scruffy's throat.

It dawned on Fry that Amy apparently lured Scruffy into the alley for a purpose — and, judging from their behavior, he couldn't decide if the purpose was amusing or disturbing.

Fry knew that Amy had a tendency to be promiscuous. But he never thought he'd see the day when she'd get romantic with a porn-obsessed janitor more than twice her age.

Amy reached out and clasped Scruffy's hands in hers.

 _This isn't like Amy at all,_ Fry thought. He figured that if she was going to get like that with somebody, a dark, rain-soaked alley would be the last place she'd do it. And Scruffy would be one of the last people she'd do it with.

A cold chill ran down Fry's spine as his nostrils were invaded by the same sweet odor he had smelled down in the sewer before Leela's mother was attacked. It was the smell of a nightwalker, and it smelled strong, as though it was emanating from somewhere nearby.

"So, is this where we're gonna . . ." Scruffy started to ask, but his remaining words caught in his throat when Amy suddenly pulled away from him.

"Hey —" Scruffy cut his cry short when he saw what was happening to Amy. His eyes bulged and his mouth dropped open in an expression of terror.

Fry matched Scruffy's horrified look as he saw Amy begin to transform. She appeared to grow in height, uttering what sounded like a grunt of pain as she lowered her head to one side and covered her face with one hand. The color began to fade from Amy's skin. She then jerked her head to the other side and hid her face with her other hand, a deeper grunt emanating from her throat. Amy's skin was now ash-gray. The grunt then crescendoed into a frightening, inhuman growl as she raised her face to the sky, then turned to face Scruffy, whom she was now taller than by a few inches.

Fry noticed to his growing horror that Amy's fingers were now tipped with razor-sharp claws.

Upon seeing Amy's face, Scruffy's face became pallid with intense fear. His legs gave out and he fell on his rear end, his breath coming out in short gasps.

"W-what the hell?" Scruffy stammered, moving backwards on his hands and feet toward the dumpsters next to Fry. "What _are_ you?"

Amy didn't answer Scruffy's question. Instead, she let out a fierce roar of attack and charged the helpless janitor.

"No! _Get away from me!_ " Scruffy shrieked, the pitch of his voice rising along with his terror.

Fry's mouth fell open and his eyes grew wide with horror as he saw what had become of Amy's formerly attractive face. Her skin was strikingly pale, pale as death. Her eyes, now green and monstrous, were narrowed into hateful slits as she glared down at what would be her prey. Saliva dripped from her canine teeth which had elongated into pointed, dagger-like fangs.

He only noticed these details for a few seconds, but it was already enough to fuel his nightmares for weeks.

Fry raised both hands over his mouth to keep from screaming as he watched Amy lunge at Scruffy with superhuman speed. She swept her arm low and quickly slashed at the janitor, plunging her claws into his stomach and up his chest.

Blood sprayed from Scruffy's fresh wounds and spattered onto the concrete ground. His body flew backward against the dumpster like a ragdoll being hit by a speeding train. Fry shut his eyes and winced at the loud bang made by Scruffy's limp body as it collided with the dumpster. The janitor then lay in a sitting position against it, motionless.

Fry's heart beat against his chest like a jackhammer. He couldn't believe what he had just witnessed, that he was this close to this fanged killing machine that used to be petite, cute Amy Wong.

As much as Fry wanted tear his eyes away from the grisly scene, he couldn't. A sort of morbid curiosity kept his eyes glued on Amy as she staggered zombie-like toward Scruffy's corpse.

Fry felt a sick, queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach watching Amy's strange, non-fluid movements as she staggered through the pool of blood that Scruffy sat dead in. It filled him with the horrifying realization that Amy was no longer human. She was now a creature — a savage, bloodthirsty creature with no restraint.

Fry's realization was all the more confirmed when Amy reached down, grabbed Scruffy's body from under his arms, and lifted him up. Then, she sank her fangs deep into the janitor's neck, feeding on his remaining blood. Copious amounts of gore spurted out from Scruffy's neck and splashed onto the concrete ground.

Fry felt bile rise up in his throat once again. He closed his eyes tightly to shut out the scene and quell his nausea, but he could still hear the sickening squelching sounds of Amy draining the blood from Scruffy's body and the gore splattering onto the ground.

 _Make it stop . . . make it stop . . ._ Fry pleaded in his mind. He felt sick to his stomach just listening to Amy feed on Scruffy. Watching and listening to a scene like this in a horror movie was bad; watching and listening to it in real life from only a few feet away was much worse because there were no cheesy-looking special effects — this was the real thing.

Knowing he could be next if he wasn't careful, Fry's stomach tied in nervous knots.

After several seconds, Amy pulled her fangs out of Scruffy's neck. The blood stopped gushing. She lifted the janitor up from under his arms and effortlessly tossed his body into an open dumpster as if it weighed nothing.

Amy then turned to look into the alley to Fry's left — his only escape route.

His heart pounding, Fry crept to the left along the wall he was crouching against, away from Amy. He lowered his display over his eyes and examined his radar.

Since she was in nightwalker form, Amy was already marked as a hostile. She appeared as a red triangle on the radar. A much larger red triangle fanned out from one point and spread across the alley that Leela had previously gone through. This triangle represented Amy's field of vision.

For half a minute, Fry watched the symbols intently, waiting for Amy to move or look away. She glared fiercely into the alley on the left and didn't budge, waiting for her next meal.

Fry's heart sank as he realized his predicament. With a dead end alley behind him and Amy guarding his only escape route, he had nowhere to go but into the eyes of the enemy.

He was trapped.

 


End file.
